1.
It is the chief office of the Holy Spirit to glorify Christ. He does
many things, but this is what he aims at in all of them, to glorify
Christ. Brethren, what the Holy Spirit does must be right for us to
imitate; therefore, let us endeavour to glorify Christ. To what
higher ends can we devote ourselves, than to something to which God
the Holy Spirit devotes himself? May this be, then, your continual
prayer, “Blessed Spirit, help me always to glorify the Lord Jesus
Christ!”

2.
Observe, that the Holy Spirit glorifies Christ by showing to us the
things of Christ. It is a great marvel that there should be any glory
given to Christ by showing him to such poor creatures as we are.
What! To make us see Christ, does that glorify him? For our weak eyes
to behold him, for our trembling hearts to know him, and to love him,
does this glorify him? It is even so, for the Holy Spirit chooses
this as his principal way of glorifying the Lord Jesus. He takes from
the things of Christ, not to show them to angels, not to write them
in letters of fire across the brow of night, but to show them to us.
Within the little temple of a sanctified heart, Christ is praised,
not so much by what we do, or think, as by what we see. This puts
great value on meditation, on the study of God’s Word, and on silent
thought under the teaching of the Holy Spirit, for Jesus says, “He
shall glorify me: for he shall take of mine, and shall show it to
you.”

3.
Here is a gospel word at the very outset of our sermon. Poor sinner,
conscious of your sin, it is possible for Christ to be glorified by
his being shown to you. If you look to him, if you see him to be a
suitable Saviour, an all-sufficient Saviour, if your mind’s eye takes
him in, if he is really shown to you by the Holy Spirit, he is
glorified by it. Sinner as you are, unworthy apparently to become the
arena of Christ’s glory, yet you shall be a temple in which the
King’s glory shall be revealed, and your poor heart, like a mirror,
shall reflect his grace.

Come, Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove,
With all thy quickening powers;

and show Christ to the sinner, so that Christ may be glorified in the
sinner’s salvation!

4.
If that great work of grace is really done at the beginning of the
sermon, I shall not mind even if I never finish it. God the Holy
Spirit will accomplish more without me than I could possibly have
accomplished myself, and to the Triune Jehovah shall be all the
praise. Oh, that the name of Christ may be glorified in every one of
you! Has the Holy Spirit shown you Christ, the Sin Bearer, the one
sacrifice for sin, exalted on high, to give repentance and remission?
If so, then the Holy Spirit has glorified Christ, even in you.

5.
Now proceeding to examine the text a little in detail, my first
observation on it is this, the Holy Spirit is our Lord’s
Glorifier: “He shall glorify me.” Secondly, Christ’s own things
are his best glory: “He shall glorify me: for he shall take of
mine, and shall show it to you”; and, thirdly, Christ’s glory is
his Father’s glory: “All things that the Father has are mine:
therefore I said that he shall take of mine, and shall show it to
you.”

6.I. To begin, then, THE HOLY SPIRIT IS OUR LORD’S GLORIFIER. I
want you to keep this truth in your mind, and never to forget it;
what does not glorify Christ is not of the Holy Spirit, and
what is of the Holy Spirit invariably glorifies our Lord Jesus
Christ.

7.
First, then, have an eye for this truth in all comforts. If a
comfort which you think you need, and which appears to you to be very
sweet, does not glorify Christ, look on it very suspiciously. If, in
conversing with an apparently religious man, he prates about truth
which he says is comforting, but which does not honour Christ, do not
have anything to do with it. It is a poisonous sweet; it may charm
you for a moment, but it will ruin your soul for ever if you partake
of it. But blessed are those comforts which smell of Christ, those
consolations in which there is a fragrance of myrrh, and aloes, and
cassia, out of the King’s palace, the comfort drawn from his person,
from his work, from his blood, from his resurrection, from his glory,
the comfort directly drawn from that sacred place where he trod the
wine-press alone. This is wine of which you may drink, and forget
your misery, and be unhappy no more; but always look with great
suspicion on any comfort offered to you, either as a sinner or a
saint, which does not come distinctly from Christ. Say, “I will not
be comforted until Jesus comforts me. I will refuse to lay aside my
despondency until he removes my sin. I will not go to Mr. Civility,
or Mr. Legality, for the unloading of my burden; no hands shall ever
lift the load of conscious sin from off my heart but those that were
nailed to the cross, when Jesus himself bore my sins in his own body
on the tree.” Please carry this truth with you wherever you go, as a
kind of spiritual litmus paper, by which you may test everything that
is presented to you as a cordial or comfort. If it does not glorify
Christ, do not let it console or please you.

8.
In the next place, have an eye for this truth in all ministries.
There are many ministries in the world, and they are very different
from each other; but this truth will enable you to judge which one is
right out of them all. That ministry which makes much of Christ, is
of the Holy Spirit; and that ministry which decries him, ignores him,
or puts him in the background in any degree, is not of the Spirit of
God. Any doctrine which magnifies man, but not man’s Redeemer, any
doctrine which denies the depth of the Fall, and consequently
detracts from the greatness of salvation, any doctrine which
makes sin less, and therefore makes Christ’s work less, — away with it,
away with it. This shall be your infallible test concerning whether
it is of the Holy Spirit or not, for Jesus says, “He shall glorify
me.” It would be better to speak five words to the glory of Christ,
than to be the greatest orator who ever lived, and to neglect or
dishonour the Lord Jesus Christ. We, my brethren, who are preachers
of the Word, only have a short time to live; let us dedicate all that
time to the glorious work of magnifying Christ. Longfellow says, in
his Psalm of Life, that “Art is long,” but longer still is the
great art of lifting up the Crucified before the eyes of the
sin-bitten sons of men. Let us keep to that one employment. If we
only have this one string on which we can play, we may produce such
music on it as would ravish angels, and will save men; therefore,
again I say, let us keep to that alone. Cornet, flute, harp, sackbut,
psaltery, dulcimer, and all kinds of music are for Nebuchadnezzar’s
golden image; but as for our God, our one harp is Christ Jesus. We
will touch every string of that wondrous instrument, even though it
is with trembling fingers, and marvellous shall be the music we shall
evoke from it.

9.
All ministries, therefore, must be subjected to this test; if they do
not glorify Christ, they are not from the Holy Spirit.

10.
We should also have an eye for this truth in all religious
movements, and judge them by this standard. If they are from the
Holy Spirit, they glorify Christ. There are great movements in the
world every now and then; we are inclined to look on them hopefully,
for any stir is better than stagnation; but, eventually we begin to
fear, with a holy jealousy, what their results will be. How shall we
judge them? To what test shall we put them? Always to this test. Does
this movement glorify Christ? Is Christ preached? Then I rejoice in
it, yes, and will rejoice. Are men pointed to Christ? Then this is
the ministry of salvation. Is he preached as first and last? Are men
told to be justified by faith in him, and then to follow him, and
copy his divine example? It is good. I do not believe that any man
ever lifted up the cross of Christ in a harmful way. If it is only
the cross that is seen, it is the sight of the cross, not of the
hands that lift it, that will bring salvation. Some modern movements
are heralded with great noise, and some come quietly; but if they
glorify Christ, it is good. But, dear friends, if it is some new
theory that is propounded, if it is some old error revived, if it is
something very glittering and fascinating, and for a while it bears
the multitudes away, think nothing of it; unless it glorifies Christ
it is not for you and me. “ Aliquid Christi , ” as one of the old
fathers said, “Anything of Christ,” and I love it; but nothing of
Christ, or something against Christ, then it may be very fine and
flowery, and it may be very fascinating and charming, highly poetic,
and in consonance with the spirit of the age; but we say of it,
“Vanity of vanities, all is vanity where there is no Christ.” Where
he is lifted up, there is all that is required for the salvation of a
guilty race. Judge every movement, then, not by those who adhere to
it, nor by those who admire and praise it, but by this word of our
Lord, “He shall glorify me.” The Spirit of God is not in it if it
does not glorify Christ.

11.
Once again, brethren, please, have an eye for this truth when you
are under a sense of great weakness, physical, mental, or
spiritual. You have finished preaching a sermon, you have completed a
round with your tracts, or you have ended your Sunday School work for
another Sabbath. You say to yourself, “I fear that I have done very
poorly.” You groan as you go to your bed because you think that you
have not glorified Christ. It is as well that you should groan if
that is the case. I will not forbid it, but I will relieve the
bitterness of your distress by reminding you that it is the Holy
Spirit who is to glorify Christ: “He shall glorify me.” If I preach,
and the Holy Spirit is with me, Christ will be glorified; but if I
were able to speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, but
without the power of the Holy Spirit, Christ would not be glorified.
Sometimes, our weakness may even help to make way for the greater
display of the might of God. If so, we may glory in infirmity, that
the power of Christ may rest on us. It is not merely we who speak,
but the Spirit of the Lord, who speaks by us. There is a sound of
abundance of rain outside the Tabernacle; oh that there were also the
sound of abundance of rain within our hearts! May the Holy Spirit
come at this moment, and come at all times whenever his servants are
trying to glorify Christ, and himself do what must always be his own
work! How can you and I glorify anyone, much less glorify him who is
infinitely glorious? But the Holy Spirit, being himself the glorious
God, can glorify the glorious Christ. It is a work worthy of God; and
it shows us, when we think of it, the absolute need of our crying to
the Holy Spirit that he would take us in his hand, and use us as a
workman uses his hammer. What can a hammer do without the hand that
grasps it, and what can we do without the Spirit of God?

12.
I will make only one more observation on this first point. If the
Holy Spirit is to glorify Christ, please have an eye for the truth
amid all oppositions, controversies, and contentions. If we alone
had the task of glorifying Christ, we might be beaten; but since the
Holy Spirit is the Glorifier of Christ, his glory is in very safe
hands. “Why do the heathen rage, and the people imagine a vain
thing?” The Holy Spirit is still in the forefront; the eternal
purpose of God to set his King on the throne, and to make Jesus
Christ reign for ever and ever, must be fulfilled, for the Holy
Spirit has undertaken to see it accomplished. Amid the surging
tumults of the battle, the result of the conflict is never in doubt
for a moment. It may seem as though the fate of Christ’s cause hung
in a balance, and that the scales were in equilibrium; but it is not
so. The glory of Christ never wanes; it must increase from day to
day, as it is made known in the hearts of men by the Holy Spirit; and
the day shall come when Christ’s praise shall go up from all human
tongues. To him every knee shall bow, and every tongue shall confess
that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Therefore,
lift up the hands that hang down, and confirm the feeble knees. If
you have failed to glorify Christ by your speech as you would,
there is Another who has done it, and who will still do it, according
to Christ’s words, “He shall glorify me.” My text seems to be a
silver bell, ringing sweet comfort into the dispirited worker’s ear,
“He shall glorify me.”

13.
That is the first point, the Holy Spirit is our Lord’s Glorifier.
Keep that truth before your mind’s eye under all circumstances.

14.II. Now, secondly, CHRIST’S OWN THINGS ARE HIS BEST GLORY. When
the Holy Spirit wants to glorify Christ, what does he do? He does not
go abroad for anything, he comes to Christ himself for what will be
for Christ’s own glory: “He shall glorify me: for he shall take of
mine, and shall show it to you.” There can be no glory added to
Christ; it must be his own glory, which he has already, which is made
more apparent to the hearts of God’s chosen by the Holy Spirit.

15.
First of all, Christ needs no new inventions to glorify him. “We
have struck out a new line of things,” one says. Have you? “We have
found out something very wonderful.” I dare say you have; but Christ,
the same yesterday, today, and for ever, wants none of your
inventions, or discoveries, or additions to his truth. A plain
Christ is always the loveliest Christ. Dress him up, and you have
deformed him and defamed him. Bring him out just as he is, the
Christ of God, nothing else but Christ, unless you bring in his
cross, for we preach Christ crucified; indeed, you cannot have the
Christ without the cross; but preach Christ crucified, and you have
given him all the glory that he wants. The Holy Spirit does not
reveal in these last times any fresh ordinances, or any novel
doctrines, or any new evolutions; but he simply brings to mind the
things which Christ himself spoke, he brings Christ’s own things to
us, and in that way glorifies him.

16.
Think for a minute of Christ’s person as revealed to us by the
Holy Spirit. What can more glorify him than for us to see his person,
very God of very God, and yet as truly man? What a wondrous being, as
human as ourselves, but as divine as God! Was there ever another like
him? Never.

17.
Think of his incarnation, his birth at Bethlehem. There was
greater glory among the oxen in the stall than was ever seen where
those born in marble halls were swathed in purple and fine linen. Was
there ever another babe like Christ? Never. I do not wonder that the
wise men fell down to worship him.

18.
Look at his life, the standing wonder of all ages. Men, who have
not worshipped him, have admired him. His life is incomparable,
unique; there is nothing like it in all the history of mankind.
Imagination has never been able to invent anything approximating to
the perfect beauty of the life of Jesus Christ.

19.
Think of his death. There have been many heroic and martyr
deaths; but there is not one that can be set side by side with
Christ’s death. He did not pay the debt of nature as others do; and
yet he paid our nature’s debt. He did not die because he must; he
died because he would. The only “must” that came on him was a
necessity of all-conquering love. The cross of Christ is the greatest
wonder of fact or of fiction; fiction invents many marvellous things,
but nothing else can be looked at for a moment in comparison with the
cross of Christ.

20.
Think of our Lord’s resurrection. If this is one of the things
that are taken, and shown to you by the Holy Spirit, it will fill you
with holy delight. I am sure that I could go into that sepulchre,
where John and Peter went, and spend a lifetime in reverencing him
who broke down the barriers of the tomb, and made it a passage way to
heaven. Instead of being a dungeon and a cul-de-sac, into which
all men seemed to go, but no one could ever come out of, Christ has,
by his resurrection, made a tunnel right through the grave. Jesus, by
dying, has killed death for all believers.

21.
Then think of his ascension. But why need I take you over all
these scenes with which you are blessedly familiar? What a wondrous
fact that, when the cloud received him out of the disciples’ sight,
the angels came to convoy him to his heavenly home!

They brought his chariot from above
To bear him to his throne;
Clapp’d their triumphant wings, and cried,
“The glorious work is done.”

22.
Think of him now, at his Father’s right hand, adored by all the
heavenly host; and then let your mind fly forward to the glory of his
Second Advent, the final judgment with its terrible terrors, the
millennium with its indescribable bliss, and the heaven of heavens,
with its endless and unparalleled splendour. If these things are
shown to you by the Holy Spirit, the beautiful visions will indeed
glorify Christ, and you will sit down, and sing with the blessed
Virgin, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit has rejoiced in
God my Saviour.”

23.
So, you see that the things which glorify Christ are all in Christ;
the Holy Spirit takes nothing from abroad, but he takes of the things
of Christ, and shows them to us. The glory of kings lies in their
silver and their gold, their silk and their gems; but the glory of
Christ lies in himself. If we want to glorify a man, we bring him
presents; if we wish to glorify Christ, we must accept presents from
him. So we take the cup of salvation, calling on the name of the
Lord, and in doing so we glorify Christ.

24.
Notice, next, that these things of Christ are too bright for us to
see until the Spirit shows them to us. We cannot see them because
of their excessive glory, until the Holy Spirit tenderly reveals them
to us, until he takes of the things of Christ, and shows them to us.

25.
What does this mean? Does it not mean, first, that he enlightens our
understandings? It is wonderful how the Holy Spirit can take a fool,
and make him know the wonders of Christ’s dying love; and he makes
him know it very quickly when he begins to teach him. Some of us have
been very slow learners, yet the Holy Spirit has been able to teach
something even to us. He opens the Scriptures, and he also opens our
minds; and when there are these two openings together, what a
wonderful opening it is! It becomes like a new revelation; the first
is the revelation of the letter, which we have in the Book; the
second is the revelation of the Spirit, which we get in our own
spirit. Oh my dear friend, if the Holy Spirit has ever enlightened
your understanding, you know what it is for him to show the things of
Christ to you!

26.
But next, he does this by a work on the whole soul. I mean this. When
the Holy Spirit convicts us of sin, we become prepared to see Christ,
and so the blessed Spirit shows Christ to us. When we are conscious
of our feebleness, then we see Christ’s strength; and so the Holy
Spirit shows him to us. Often, the operations of the Spirit of God
may seem not to be directly the showing of Christ to us, but as they
prepare us for seeing him, they are a part of the work.

27.
The Holy Spirit sometimes shows Christ to us by his power of
vivifying the truth. I do not know whether I can quite tell you what
I mean; but I have sometimes seen a truth differently from what I
have ever seen it before. I knew it long ago, I acknowledged it as
part of the divine revelation; but now I understand it, grip it,
grasp it, or what is better, it seems to get a grip on me, and holds
me in its mighty hands. Have you not sometimes been overjoyed with a
promise which never seemed to be anything to you before? Or a
doctrine, which you believed, but never fully appreciated, has
suddenly become to you a gem of the first water, a very
Koh-i-noor, {a} or, “Mountain of Light.” The Holy Spirit has a way of
focusing light, and when it falls in this special way on a certain
point, then the truth is revealed to us. He shall take of the things
of Christ, and show them to you. Have you never felt ready to jump
for joy, ready to spring from your seat, ready to sit up in your bed
at night, and sing praises to God through the overpowering influence
of some grand old truth which has seemed to be at once quite new to
you?

28.
The Holy Spirit also shows to us the things of Christ in our
experience. As we journey on in life, we pass uphill and down dale,
through bright sunlight and through dark shadows, and in each of
these conditions we learn a little more about Christ, a little more
about his grace, a little more about his glory, a little more about
his sin-bearing, a little more about his glorious righteousness.
Blessed is the life which is just one long lesson on the glory of
Christ; and I think that is what every Christian life should be.
“Every dark and bending line” in our experience should meet in the
centre of Christ’s glory, and should lead us nearer and nearer to the
power of enjoying the bliss at his right hand for ever and ever. So
the Holy Spirit takes of the things of Christ, and shows them to us,
and so glorifies Christ.

29.
Beloved, the practical lesson for us to learn is this, let us try
to remain under the influence of the Holy Spirit. To that end, let
us think very reverently of him. Some never think of him at all. How
many sermons there are without even an allusion to him! Shame on the
preachers of such discourses! If any hearers come without praying for
the Holy Spirit, shame on such hearers! We know and we confess that
he is everything to our spiritual life; then why do we not remember
him with greater love, and worship him with greater honour, and think
of him continually with greater reverence? Beware of committing the
sin against the Holy Spirit. If any of you feel any gentle touches of
his power when you are hearing a sermon, beware lest you harden your
heart against it. Whenever the sacred fire comes as only a spark, do
not quench the Holy Spirit, but pray that the spark may become a
flame. And you, Christian people, cry to him that you may not read
your Bibles without his light. Do not pray without being helped by
the Spirit; above all, may you never preach without the Holy Spirit!
It seems a pity when a man asks to be guided by the Spirit in his
preaching, and then pulls out a manuscript, and reads it. The Holy
Spirit may bless what he reads; but he cannot very well guide him
when he has tied himself down to what he has written. And it will be
the same with the speaker if he only repeats what he has learned, and
leaves no room for the Spirit to give him a new thought, a fresh
revelation of Christ; how can he hope for the divine blessing under
such circumstances? Oh, it would be better for us to sit still
until some of us were moved by the Spirit to get up and speak, than
for us to prescribe the methods by which he should speak to us, and
even to write down the very words we intend to utter! What room is
there for the Spirit’s operations then?

“Come, Holy Spirit, heavenly Dove,”

I cannot help breaking out into that prayer, “Blessed Spirit, remain
with us, take of the things of Christ, and show them to us, so that
Christ may be glorified.”

30.III. I am only going to speak a minute or two on the last point.
It is a very deep one, much too deep for me. I am unable to take you
into the depths of my text, I will not pretend to do so; I believe
that there are meanings here which probably we shall never understand
until we get to heaven. “What you do not know now, you shall know
hereafter.” But this is the point, CHRIST’S GLORY IS HIS FATHER’S
GLORY: “All things that the Father has are mine: therefore I said
that he shall take of mine, and shall show it to you.”

31.
First, Christ has all that the Father has. Do think of that. No
mere man dares to say, “All things that the Father has are mine.” All
the Godhead is in Christ; not only all its attributes, but the
essence of it. The Nicene Creed well puts it, and it is not too
strong in the expression: “Light of Light, very God of very God,” for
Christ has all that the Father has. When we come to Christ, we come
to omnipotent omnipresent omniscience; we come to almighty
immutability; we come, in fact, to the eternal Godhead. The Father
has all things, and all power is given to Christ in heaven and on
earth, so that he has all that the Father has.

32.
And, further, the Father is glorified in Christ’s glory. Never
let us fall into the false notion that, if we magnify Christ, we are
depreciating the Father. If any lips have ever spoken concerning the
Christ of God so as to depreciate the God of Christ, let those lips
be covered with shame. We never did preach Christ as being merciful,
and the Father as being only just, or Christ as moving the Father to
be gracious. That is a slander which has been cast on us, but there
is not a shred of truth in it. We have known and believed what Christ
himself said, “I and my Father are one.” The more glorious Christ
is, the more glorious the Father is; and when men, professedly
Christians, begin to cast off Christ, they cast off God the Father to
a large extent. Irreverence to the Son of God soon becomes
irreverence to God the Father himself. But, dear friends, we
delight to honour Christ, and we will continue to do so. Even when we
stand in the heaven of heavens, before the burning throne of the
infinite Jehovah, we will sing praises to him and to the Lamb,
putting the two for evermore in that divine conjunction in which they
are always to be found.

33.
So, you see, Christ has all that the Father has, and when he is
glorified, the Father also is glorified.

34.
Next, the Holy Spirit must lead us to see this, and I am sure
that he will. If we give ourselves up to his teaching, we shall fall
into no errors. It will be a great mystery, but we shall know enough,
so that it will never trouble us. If you sit down and try to study
the mystery of the Eternal, well, I believe that the longer you look,
the more you will be like people who look into the sea from a great
height, until they grow dizzy, and are ready to fall and to be
drowned. Believe what the Spirit teaches you, and adore your Divine
Teacher; then his instruction shall become easy for you. I believe
that, as we grow older, we come to worship God as Abraham did, as
Jehovah, the great I AM. Jesus does not fade into the background;
but the glorious Godhead seems to become more and more apparent to
us. Our Lord’s word to his disciples, “You believe in God, believe
also in me,” as we grow older, seems to turn into this, “You believe
in me, believe also in God.” And as we come to a full confidence in
the glorious Lord, the God of nature, and of providence, and of
redemption, and of heaven, the Holy Spirit teaches us more of the
glories of Christ.

35.
I have talked with you as well as I could on this sublime theme, and
if I did not know that the Holy Spirit glorifies Christ, I should go
home miserable, for I have not been able to glorify my Lord as I
wished; but I know that the Holy Spirit can take what I have said out
of my very heart, and can put it into your hearts, and he can add to
it whatever I have omitted. You who love the Lord, go and glorify
him. Try to do it by your lips and by your lives. Go, and preach him,
preach more of him, and preach him up higher, and higher, and higher.
The old lady, of whom I have heard, made a mistake in what she said,
yet there was a truth behind her blunder. She had been to a little
Baptist chapel, where a high Calvinist preached, and on coming away
she said that she liked “High Calvary” preachers best. So do I. Give
me a “High Calvary” preacher, one who will make Calvary the highest
of all the mountains. I suppose it was not a hill at all, but only a
mound; still, let us lift it higher and higher, and say to all other
hills, “Why do you leap, you high hills? This is the hill which God
desires to dwell in; yes, the Lord will dwell in it for ever.” The
crucified Christ is wiser than all the wisdom of the world. The cross
of Christ has more novelty in it than all the new things of the
earth. Oh believers and preachers of the gospel, glorify Christ!
May the Holy Spirit help you to do so!

36.
And you, poor sinners, who think that you cannot glorify Christ at
all, come and trust him, —

Come naked, come filthy,
Come just as you are,

and believe that he will receive you; for that will glorify him.
Believe, even now, oh sinner at death’s door, that Christ can make
you live; for your faith will glorify him! Look up out of the awful
depths of hell into which conscience has cast you, and believe that
he can pull you up out of the horrible pit, and out of the miry clay,
and set your feet on a rock; for your trust will glorify him! It is
in the power of the sinner to give Christ the greatest glory, if the
Holy Spirit enables him to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. You may
come, you who are more leprous, more diseased, more corrupt, than any
other; and if you look to him, and he saves you, oh, then you will
praise him! You will be of the mind of the one I have spoken of many
times, who said to me, “Sir, you say that Christ can save me. Well,
if he does, he shall never hear the end of it.” No, and he never will
hear the end of it. Blessed Jesus, —

I will love thee in life, I will love thee in death,
And praise thee as long as thou lendest me breath;
And say when the death-dew lies cold on my brow,
If ever I loved thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.
In mansions of glory and endless delight,
I’ll ever adore thee in heaven so bright;
I’ll sing with the glittering crown on my brow,
If ever I loved thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.

We will do nothing else but praise Christ, and glorify him, if he
will only save us from sin. May God grant that it may be so with
every one of us, for the Lord Jesus Christ’s sake! Amen.

{a}Koh-i-noor: An Indian diamond, famous for its size and
history, which became one of the British Crown jewels on the
annexation of the Punjaub in 1849. OED.

ExpositionBy C. H. Spurgeon{Joh 14:1-16}

1.I have spoken these things to you, that you should not
be offended.

Or, “made to stumble.” Christ would not have you who are his people
caused to stumble by anything that happens to you. He wants you to
walk without tripping; his angels bear you up in their hands lest at
any time you should dash your foot against a stone. He himself, as
your Guardian, comes and speaks beforehand to let you know what is to
occur to you, so that you may not be caused to stumble by any new
trial that may assail you.

2.They shall put you out of the synagogues: yes, the time
comes, that whoever kills you will think that he does God service.

Christ’s disciples were to expect opposition of the most cruel kind.
They were to be put away from those with whom they had long
worshipped; they were even to run the risk of losing their lives; but
Jesus foretold what would happen to them, that they might not be
surprised by it. Such was their Lord’s love for them that he would
not have them attacked unawares; by his grace, they would hold on,
and hold out, they would persevere to the end; but there would have
to be a struggle, and to help them in the fight, Jesus tells them all
about it before it begins. We say, “Forewarned, forearmed.” So the
disciples were; and so are you. Your Lord tells you that you will not
get to heaven without trials: “In the world you shall have
tribulation.” And he tells you this so that it may not surprise you
when it comes, that it may not act on you like a sudden gust of wind
that would upset a little ship; but that you may just keep everything
in trim looking for the storm to come: “I have spoken these things to
you, that you should not be caused to stumble.”

3.And they will do these things to you because they have
not known the Father, nor me.

The persecuting Jews professed to be worshippers of Jehovah; but they
did not know the Christ, whom he sent, and, therefore, in very truth
they did not know the Father either. How can you expect that those
who do not know the Father will know the Son, or any of the other
children of the divine family? Since they rejected the Elder Brother,
will they not also reject the younger ones? Is the disciple to be
above his Master, or the servant to be treated better than his Lord?
Do not think so; and therefore expect that you will not be known,
even as the Father and the Son were not known.

’Tis no surprising thing,
That we should be unknown:
The Jewish world knew not their King,
God’s everlasting Son.

4.But I have told you these things, so that when the time
shall come, you may remember that I told you about them. And I did
not say these things to you at the beginning, because I was with
you.

Our Lord told his disciples something about “these things.” He warned
them to expect opposition, but he did not dwell on that theme, he did
not expound on it. He did not at first give that prominence to it
which he was about to do, and he explains to his disciples why he had
not talked much on that topic: “because I was with you.” It did not
matter how they were opposed as long as he was with them; his company
more than made up for anything they might have to suffer, and, dear
child of God, if you now enjoy the presence of Christ, and the power
of his Spirit, you need not care what happens to you.

5, 6.But now I go my way to him who sent me; and none of
you asks me, “Where are you going?” But because I have said these
things to you, sorrow has filled your heart.

They were cast down because he was going away from them. Love awoke
fear. It was a hard thing for them to have to miss him; they could
not tell what might happen to them when their Leader was gone from
their midst. Do you wonder that they were filled with sorrow? Yet
there was no real cause for grief; there was rather reason for
rejoicing when they understood the true lesson of Christ’s departure.
There is no real cause for your sorrow, dear friends. If you knew all
things, you would greatly rejoice in that very thing that now most
troubles you.

7.Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for
you that I go away: for if I do not go away, the Comforter will not
come to you; but if I depart, I will send him to you.

And the Comforter is better for us than the personal presence of
Christ. We do not always think so; but it is true. It is better for
the Church to have the Holy Spirit in the midst of her, than for
Christ to be here in bodily presence on the earth.

37.And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin,
and of righteousness, and of judgment:

The world is not as yet convinced, but it is convicted, though it
does not admit its guilt there is more than sufficient evidence to
prove it is guilty in the sight of God.

9.Of sin, because they do not believe on me;

What must be the depth of human wickedness that sinners will not
accept a Divine Saviour! This is the crowning, crushing proof of
human guilt: “They do not believe on me.”

10.Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and you
see me no more;

Christ was righteous, the righteous One, whom men rejected, for he
has gone up to the Father’s side, where he could not have been if he
had not perfected righteousness. The very going back of Christ to the
Father’s throne proves that righteousness does exist, and convicts
men of sinning against it.

11.Of judgment, because the prince of this world is
judged.

The gospel judges him and dethrones him, and just as there has been
a judgment of the world’s king, so there will be a judgment of the
world itself.

12.I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot
bear them now.

Some teachers overload their hearers with truth until I might truly
say that they pile on the agony. Truth which cannot be received is
often most irksome and burdensome to the hearer; when the mind is not
in a fit condition to bear any more instruction, it is cruel work to
impose it. Our Lord Jesus did not overburden his disciples like this:
“I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.”

13.However when he the Spirit of truth, is come, he will
guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself;

This is a very wonderful expression: “He shall not speak of himself.”
We have plenty of men, nowadays, who boast that they do speak of or
from themselves; that is to say, they profess to borrow from no one,
not even from God. They are original thinkers, inventors, they bring
out new things out of the depth of their wonderful minds; but even
the Holy Spirit is here said not to “speak of himself.”

13.But whatever he shall hear, that he shall speak;

That is just our business, to hear God’s message, and then to speak
it and if the Holy Spirit does this, and if Jesus did it, we also may
be glad to do the same. We are no inventors of great novelties; we
are simply the message-bearers of the Most High, the declarers of the
old truths which God has revealed to us.

13-16.And he will show you things to come. He shall
glorify me: for he shall take of mine, and shall show it to you. All
things that the Father has are mine: therefore I said that he shall
take of mine, and shall show it to you. A little while, and you shall
not see me: and again, a little while, and you shall see me, because
I go to the Father.

How wonderful this is! We are to see Jesus because he has gone to the
Father. It looks as if that would be a reason why we should not see
him, but we see him better, by faith, now that he has gone to the
Father, than we could have seen him while he was here below covered
with the veil of his humiliation. Yet it is hardly surprising that
the disciples were puzzled by their Lord’s words: “A little while,
and you shall not see me: and again, a little while, and you shall
see me”: and, “Because I go to the Father.”

Jesus Christ, His Praise426 — Christ’s Sufferings And Glory1 Now for a tune of lofty praise
To great Jehovah’s equal Son!
Awake, my voice, in heavenly lays,
Tell the loud wonders he hath done!
2 Sing how he left the worlds of light,
And the bright robes he wore above;
How swift and joyful was his flight,
On wings of everlasting love!
3 Down to this base, this sinful earth,
He came to raise our nature high;
He came to atone Almighty wrath;
Jesus, the God, was born to die.
4 Deep in the shades of gloomy death
The Almighty Captive prisoner lay;
The Almighty Captive left the earth,
And rose to everlasting day.
5 Lift up your eyes, ye sons of light,
Up to his throne of shining grace!
See what immortal glories sit
Round the sweet beauties of his face!
6 Amongst a thousand hearts and songs,
Jesus, the God, exalted reigns;
His sacred name fills all their tongues,
And echoes through the heavenly plains.
Isaac Watts, 1709.

Jesus Christ, His Praise437 — Blessed Be His Name<7s.>1 Brethren, let us join to bless
Christ our Peace and Righteousness;
Let our praise to him be given,
High at God’s right hand in heaven.
2 Son of God, to thee we bow,
Thou art Lord, and only thou;
Thou the woman’s promised seed;
Thou, who didst for sinners bleed.
3 Thee the angels ceaseless sing,
Thee we praise, our Priest and King;
Worthy is thy name of praise,
Full of glory, full of grace.
4 Thou hast the glad tidings brought,
Of salvation fully wrought;
Wrought, Oh Lord, alone by thee,
Wrought, to set thy people free.
5 Thee, our Lord, would we adore,
Serve and follow more and more;
Praise and bless thy matchless love,
Till we join thy saints above.
John Cennick, 1742, a.

Jesus Christ, His Praise416 — “Worthy Is The Lamb”<6.6.4.6.6.6.4.>1 Glory to God on high!
Let earth and skies reply,
Praise ye his name:
His love and grace adore,
Who all our sorrows bore,
Sing aloud evermore,
Worthy the Lamb!
2 Jesus, our Lord and God,
Bore sin’s tremendous load,
Praise ye his name:
Tell what his arm hath done,
What spoils from death he won:
Sing his great name alone:
Worthy the Lamb!
3 While they around the throne
Cheerfully join in one,
Praising his name:
Those who have felt his blood
Sealing their peace with God,
Sound his dear fame abroad:
Worthy the Lamb!
4 Join all ye ransomed race,
Our holy Lord to bless;
Praise ye his name:
In him we will rejoice,
And make a joyful noise,
Shouting with heart and voice,
Worthy the Lamb!
5 What though we change our place,
Yet we shall never cease
Praise his dear name;
To him our songs we bring,
Hail him our gracious, King.
And, without ceasing sing,
Worthy the Lamb!
6 Then let the hosts above,
In realms of endless love,
Praise his dear name;
To him ascribed be
Honour and majesty;
Through all eternity:
Worthy the Lamb!
James Allen, 1761, a.

Spurgeon Sermons

These sermons from Charles Spurgeon are a series that is for reference and not necessarily a position of Answers in Genesis. Spurgeon did not entirely agree with six days of creation and dives into subjects that are beyond the AiG focus (e.g., Calvinism vs. Arminianism, modes of baptism, and so on).